Miller: Cabrera, Colon prove that cheaters can indeed prosper

Dec. 6, 2012

Updated Aug. 21, 2013 1:17 p.m.

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Despite being suspended 50 games last season for testing positive for a performance-enhancing drug, Melky Cabrera will get a raise next season. He recently signed a two-year, $16 million contract with Toronto. JEFF CHIU, AP

Despite being suspended 50 games last season for testing positive for a performance-enhancing drug, Melky Cabrera will get a raise next season. He recently signed a two-year, $16 million contract with Toronto. JEFF CHIU, AP

The motivation was to clean up the sport, to deflate the absurdity, to make baseball believable again.

As a bonus, the game's caretakers loved to tell us, a message would be sent, sent to players, fans and kids – yeah, especially to kids – about the use of performance-enhancing drugs.

Well, like never before, this offseason has sent a message about PEDs, all right, made a statement clear and undeniable.

With the free-agent signings of busted cheats Melky Cabrera and Bartolo Colon, it would be easy to say that the message isn't don't do PEDs but rather don't get caught doing PEDs.

Good work, baseball. We have an environment in which the average fan is now immune to the use of steroids, stimulants and HGH, an environment in which most fans don't even care, and now the game has shrugged its shoulders, too, by heaping financial bonuses on the frauds.

The size of the contracts of Cabrera and Colon are two more jokes for a sport that was laughably reluctant to police this stuff in the first place.

Cabrera embarrassed all of baseball when, as the reigning All-Star Game MVP, he was nabbed in mid-August and banned 50 games. The Giants immediately made it known they didn't want him back.

Toronto, though, is suddenly serious about winning again, the Blue Jays spending this offseason reshaping their roster and their projections. In signing Cabrera to the contract they did, however, they left their priorities grossly misshapen.

Cabrera not only received a $2 million raise over his 2012 salary of $6 million, but he also – incredibly – was given a second season at another $8 million. Why, exactly, would a player who just showed himself to be 100-percent untrustworthy be promised a second season?

The two-year, $16 million contract is easily the most lucrative of Cabrera's career. It could not be more pain and simple, folks. A convicted phony was just rewardedfor numbers attained artificially and illegally.

Stop laughing, people. This is totally serious here.

Cabrera never batted higher than .280 until hitting .305 and .346 the past two seasons. He averaged one homer every 115 at-bats in 2010. The past two years he averaged a home run every 39 at-bats.

Cabrera is only 28, and baseball still has late bloomers. But baseball no longer has the benefit of the doubt. So we'll continue doubting Cabrera and his production, OK?

That brings us to Colon, who – again, incredibly – was re-signed by Oakland, the very team he abandoned in 2012, the team that won't have him for the start of 2013 because he's still on suspension.

Yet, the A's were compelled to reward Colon, too, with a $1 million raise over last season. The one-year, $3 million contract represents Colon's highest base salary since 2007, when he was still with the Angels.

See how funny this is?

To complete the punch line, Oakland included another $2 million in apparently attainable performance bonuses, assuming Colon is able to dodge another positive test.

Sorry, but this is a player who turns 40 in May. To think Colon, at that age, could stay clean and repeat what he was going in 2012 before getting caught is foolish.

After not reaching 100 innings in four consecutive big-league seasons, Colon pitched 164 1/3 in 2011 and 152 1/3 in 2012. Hard to believe, literally hard to believe.

Both Cabrera and Colon shamed their teams and their sport. Both obviously believed they were incapable of excelling within the rules. Because of their actions, both in essence quit on their teammates.

In a fit of brilliant karma, the A's advanced to the playoffs without Colon and the Giants won the World Series without Cabrera.

Both players did the crime and both will do their time, yes. This is America and we all believe in second chances.

But neither Cabrera nor Colon should be rewarded. They should be given legitimate opportunities, sure, but not fatter pay days.

The Blue Jays and A's would argue that the contracts are the cost of doing business, just a reflection of the market. If that's the case, both teams should have taken their business elsewhere and left the cheaters begging for those second chances.

Another suspension would cost either player 100 games and, yes, all the respective salary would be forfeited.

But what's wrong with making a player with a stained past prove himself step-by-step, game-by-game in the future?

How's about a more novel concept? Cabrera and Colon should take cuts in salary and not receive any one of their paychecks until passing PED tests.

Now that would be a message to send. Sadly, baseball has decided to make a different statement completely, one that could produce anger if it weren't so damn comical.

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